


Five Things That Should Have Happened in Canon, and One That Should Have Stuck To Canon

by gardnerhill



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Book: A Study in Scarlet, Book: The Sign of the Four, Book: The Valley of Fear, Community: watsons_woes, Episode: s02e01 A Scandal in Belgravia, Gen, Prompt Fic, Story: The Adventure of the Three Gables, Story: The Five Orange Pips
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-25 12:43:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,063
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7533241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gardnerhill/pseuds/gardnerhill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five ACD Stories that Should Have Diverged from Canon, and One Adaptation that Should Have Stuck to ACD Canon</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Things That Should Have Happened in Canon, and One That Should Have Stuck To Canon

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2016 July Watson's Woes Promptfest prompt #19, **Great Minds Think Alike:** So many of you provided wonderful prompts along the lines of "AU", it would be criminal not to let you choose from among the myriad visions. Pick one or more of the following and have fun! …My selection, **How It Should Have Ended.**

**Five ACD Stories that Should Have Diverged from Canon, and One Adaptation that Should Have Stuck to ACD Canon**

****1.** **

****THE ADVENTURE OF THE THREE GABLES:**** The black boxer loomed over us, glaring. “Masser Holmes, I’se here to warn you off!” He shook himself. “Why the hell am I talking like a minstrel show?”

Holmes and I looked at each other, and Holmes shrugged. “Don’t look at us, Mr. Dixie. We’re hardly being written by Mark Twain.”

“You might find more agreeable employment in America right now.” I handed Steve a card from my literary agent. “Miss Ida B. Wells of Memphis, Tennessee, is a Negro activist who publishes an anti-lynching newsletter. She gets death threats every day, and very likely needs a good bodyguard.”

Steve Dixie took the card. “Hm! Sounds better than busting heads for some crazy white lady. It’s a deal.” And he was gone.

****2.** **

****THE SIGN OF FOUR:**** Holmes interrupted Mr. Thaddeus Sholto. “I believe I have the story straight. One group of British invaders stole a chestload of treasures from Indian nationals, only to be stolen from those thieves by Major Morstan and your father, which was then stolen from them by this Four gang. Do I have that right?”

Sholto spluttered and stammered and turned beet-red. But he calmed and said through his clenched teeth, “That could certainly be one way of looking at it.”

“Then in that case,” Holmes said pleasantly, “my true role here is to return the Agra treasures to their rightful owners, courtesy of the Indian Embassy. Because in my eyes, an English gentleman in an officer’s uniform who helps himself to a foreign palace’s riches is no less a thief than a London slum-rat in a bank-vault who fills his pockets.”

“Then I’m poor as a church-mouse after all,” Miss Morstan said, with a look of decided relief in her eyes – which turned into something a good deal warmer as she looked at me, and found the sentiment returned. “Mr. Holmes, do be sure to include my four ill-gotten pearls with the returned gems; I could never wear them in good conscience again.”

****3.** **

****A STUDY IN SCARLET, PART II: THE COUNTRY OF THE SAINTS:** ** “In the central portion of the great North American Continent there lies an arid and repulsive desert…”

I interrupted Jefferson Hope. “You don’t have long to live, you realise that.”

Our prisoner blinked and took a breath. “Right. Well, I fell in love with this girl, these two bastards killed her father and forced her to marry one of ‘em instead of me, the grief killed her on her wedding day, and I spent 20 years tracking these sons a bitches down, until I got a job in London–”

“As a cab-driver,” Sherlock Holmes concluded. “The rest we know.”

****4.** **

****THE VALLEY OF FEAR:**** Nope, never happened, keep going, nothing to see, move along.

****5.** **

****THE FIVE ORANGE PIPS:**** ”You are threatened by a very real and imminent danger.” Holmes looked very grave, considering John Openshaw’s obvious youth and inexperience of the wicked ways of the world.

I spoke before Holmes could ask. “Mr. Openshaw, I will come with you back to your home tonight. You could very well need an armed companion before the sun rises.” I saw Holmes hesitate for just a breath, his mouth open, before he closed it and nodded firmly. I was not the only one afraid of this K.K.K. gang, clearly.

The youth made some feeble attempt at protest, but his eyes and body spoke of profound relief. That alone put an iron edge to my fear, as if sharpening a sabre. I had an innocent to protect tonight, a client to keep safe.

My time living with Holmes has made me a quick and able packer, and I was ready in 5 minutes to accompany John Openshaw in his cab to the train station.

It was as well I came with young Openshaw, for the brutes had waited to waylay him at Waterloo Bridge, just across from where the cab let us off. They had not expected to face two men – one of them a seasoned and well-armed soldier. I had the three culprits flattened and bleeding in the mud before Openshaw even thought to raise his fists in aggression. A Constable Cook of H Division came over at the sound of the fight and the cries of the brigands, recognised me as Holmes’ companion, and between us we cuffed or otherwise immobilized the assailants.

I went along with Openshaw to his train back home, where he obeyed Holmes’ orders to the letter. But none came to take the papers left at the sundial, and a telegram from my friend (ALL CAUGHT LAST NIGHT STOP OPENSHAW SAFE NOW STOP COME HOME SH) let me know that a great tragedy had indeed been averted.

****And One.** **

****A SCANDAL IN BELGRAVIA:** ** “So, Irene Adler,” Sherlock thought with no small satisfaction as he strode toward the execution site at the airport runway, clad in his cunning disguise. “You thought you could outwit Sherlock Holmes, but instead you showed typical female weakness by falling in love with me instead. Now you are literally on your knees before me, and your very life is in my hands. How lucky for you that I am gracious to women and other inferior life-forms.”

The captured spy typed a goodbye message, pocketed her phone, and waited. Sherlock stood just over her, holding the scimitar he’d nicked from a warehouse full of Rudolph Valentino’s old movie props, waiting for just the right –

“Oh my God what’s _that_!” the woman cried in terror, head whipping around.

For just a second Sherlock whipped his head around to look too. In the same second he realised he’d been bamboozled and whipped his head back.

She was gone.

The little plane behind everyone screeched, and took off.

The squad of armed men yelled at each other, running here and there, scrambling to their Toyota trucks and Jeeps, calling their superiors, yelling at Air Traffic Control. And amid it all, one black-clad Englishman stood with a dangling scimitar and a dazed expression.

His phone moaned orgasmically.

_Under-estimating women – a weakness found in far too many males, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, and one I have no trouble exploiting. Say good-bye to your brother for me, Junior._

_P.S. Dictionary definition of “lesbian” attached._


End file.
